Braintree Fire to Receive Donation of 200 Naloxone Auto-Injectors

From the Office of State Senator John Keenan:

In the midst of an opioid addiction crisis, communities across Massachusetts have expanded their use of naloxone, a drug that can temporarily reverse the effects of an opioid or heroin overdose. Although a precise count is not maintained, estimates range in the thousands for the number of lives saved since the state’s department of public health began distributing naloxone through a pilot program. Recently the Braintree Fire Department reported more than 50 overdose reversals between February 2014 and June 2015.

As more agencies adopt the use of naloxone, state officials are taking steps to mitigate the associated costs on municipal budgets. Working with a national manufacturer, Braintree’s state delegation – which includes State Senator John Keenan, State Senator Brian Joyce, and Representative Mark Cusack – has secured a donation of naloxone auto-injector devices to be delivered in the coming weeks. Braintree’s first responders will receive 200 of the devices, each of which carries a dose of naloxone that can be safely administered with minimal training.

“We are pleased to be making this donation as a part of our commitment to widen access to naloxone,” said Mark A. Herzog, Vice President of Corporate Affairs at kaléo. “Even people who take their opioid pain medications as prescribed can be at risk for an opioid emergency, such as an overdose. On average, 44 people die each day from prescription opioid overdose alone, and more than 80 percent of those are unintentional. We are honored to support the outstanding efforts of the first responder community to help save the lives of those who are experiencing an opioid emergency.”

Sharp spikes in the price of naloxone have prompted several steps to help cities and towns maintain their supplies of the product. In addition to these donations, the State Legislature this summer created a bulk purchasing fund to offset costs and to negotiate price discounts through aggregated purchasing power. Officials hope that the approval of new delivery methods, such as the auto-injector devices being donated, will also help curb costs as more manufacturers enter the market.

Senator Keenan says this is only one of several steps the Legislature has taken against opioid addiction and overdose deaths. “Our first responders are life savers,” Keenan said, “but when they administer this product it is really a last resort. It means we’ve let a person fall so far into addiction that they are literally on the brink of death.”

In recent sessions the Legislature has created a sober homes accreditation program, required educational materials to be distributed with each opioid prescription, established a drug formulary commission to enforce the use of abuse-deterrent pills whenever available, set a minimum requirement for insurers to cover addiction treatment when ordered by a health care provider, and tripled funding to the Prescription Monitoring Program to improve data sharing across state lines – but none of these changes have yet been brought into effect. Most will take effect this fall, and legislators say they look forward to working with Governor Baker and his staff as they develop these various new programs.